Oddly Still

I Want You to Understand Chicago Politics Chicago 2025-11-08 I want you to understand what it is like to live in Chicago during this time. Every day my phone buzzes. It is a neighborhood group: four people were kidnapped at the corner drugstore. A friend a mile away sends a Slack message: she was at the scene when masked men assaulted and abducted two people on the street. A plumber working on my pipes is distraught, and I find out that two of his employees were kidnapped that morning. A week later it happens again. An email arrives. Agents with guns have chased a teacher into the school where she works. They did not have a warrant. They dragged her away, ignoring her and her colleagues’ pleas to show proof of her documentation. That evening I stand a few feet from the parents of Rayito de Sol and listen to them describe, with anguish, how good Ms. Diana was to their children. What it is like to have strangers with guns traumatize your kids. For a teacher to hide a three-year-old child for fear they might be killed. How their relatives will no longer leave the house. I hear the pain and fury in their voices, and I wonder who will be next. Understand what it is to pray in Chicago. On September 19th, Reverend David Black, lead pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was praying outside the ICE detention center in Broadview when a DHS agent shot him in the head with pepper balls. Pepper balls are never supposed to be fired at the head because they can seriously injure, or even kill. “We could hear them laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” Black recalled. He is not the only member of the clergy ICE has assaulted. Methodist pastor Hannah Kardon was violently arrested on October 17th, and Baptist pastor Michael Woolf was shot with pepper balls on November 1st. Understand what it is to sleep in Chicago. On the night of September 30th, federal agents rappelled from a Black Hawk helicopter to execute a raid on an apartment building on the South Sho…

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer.

He is a computer safety researcher.

And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine.

In under 1600 words.

aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

Noted racist and Nobel Laureate James Watson, who stole Rosalind Franklin's data to try to deduce the structure of DNA first, has died at 97 as an unrepentant eugenicist and misogynist.

apropos james watson’s death i had an idle thought today about how stupid race/iq stuff sounds. “buh if your skin is darker you are biologically less smart” is a thing only a dumbass can believe

I found this piece sad too, but mostly because it is part of a years-long effort by progressives to understand what "really" animates Trump voters.

We already know! It is racism, misogyny and misinformation. I know that sounds condescending or whatever but it's simply what all evidence suggests.

The Walton family (who own Walmart) are worth over $400 billion, yet many of their employees are on SNAP.

Bezos is worth over $400 billion, many Amazon employees require SNAP.

The people who need help are not the problem.

It’s corporate greed. It’s an unwillingness to pay a living wage.

if you see this post, your actions are:
- if you have a spare buck, give it to Wikipedia, then repost this
- if you don't have a spare buck, just repost

your action is mandatory for the world's best source of information to survive

Controversial opinion but if you’re a ‘former Nazi’ and your entire bit is now pleading that people Nazis hate should forgive them, you’re actually still a Nazi.

You know how billionaires end up with severe cognitive deficits as a result of becoming surrounded by yes men who constantly tell them their every idea is genius? What if we made a bot that just does that to everyone. I think that would be a good idea.

Let me be less vague. For a certain type of person:

1) It's safer to argue with Black people than to actually confront white supremacy.

2) It's incredibly threatening to consider that the world might be how Black people say it is rather than what you've always been taught.
bsky.app/profile/polo...

There are lots of reasons you *would* stop being friends with someone. We know it's not a matter of tolerating anything. But somehow, being racist is explicitly tolerated. Why is that? Ask people if they can explain why exactly it's not bad enough to qualify.

lol omg

blatant lies and projection

hot damn israeli ministers sound like fucking lame comic book villains

pathetic

not surprised that 7.30 is platforming them with zero pushback

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

Israel concocting a narrative about Greta Thunberg being a Hamas operative is a startlingly obvious pretext to what they’re about to do to her and the crew of the flotilla: either kill outright or brutalise.If taken into custody she will be subject to torture and sexual violence.

Tom Nichols, Jon Stewart, etc in 2024: "it's too early to call them fascists"

Trump regime in 2025: "it is now illegal terrorism to call us fascists"

Funny how the time window on that worked

Reminder that Canada and Australia play the role of ‘good coloniser’ and recognising Palestine this late into the genocide is part of that narrative.

They’re still supplying weapons, still using Israeli talking points.

Must watch - what the doctor reports is pure evil.

A few more western nations - like Australia - have just made the largely performative gesture of recognizing the state of Palestine.

OK, but that's not how you stop Israel's sadistic, targeted murder of children. #GazaGenocide #auspol

In March of 2024, Mike Johnson personally invited Christian nationalist pastor Jack Hibbs to deliver a prayer to the House of Representatives. When people complained, Hibbs lashed out at his critics, labeling them "literal cancers" who are no different than "those of the Third Reich under Hitler."

Charlie Kirk in his own words: ‘prowling Blacks’ and ‘the great replacement strategy’ The far-right commentator didn’t pull his punches when discussing his bigoted views on current events

Good that the Guardian is calling Kirk “far right” and showings its readers his views - not “common sense”, not “conservative”, but far right conspiracy.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

YouTube screenshot of Face the Nation from CBS News: Jack Posobiec reflects on the life of his friend Charlie Kirk

I'd list all the things Jack Posobiec is known for, but I think it would get me banned on Bluesky in the current environment of automated moderation.

Let's just say he has an extensive page at the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Anyway, CBS News is talking with Posobiec about his friend Charlie Kirk.

‘Violence is never the answer…’ really feels like when you punch a bully back and they’re suddenly like ‘whoa bro can we talk about this bro…’

Today we remember 11 September 1973, where Chile’s democratically elected Allende govt. was overthrown in a military coup backed by Washington and facilitated by Australia’s intelligence services.

The result was Pinochet’s dictatorship that killed and tortured thousands.

🧵👇

Howard was a diminutive control freak driving a clown car down the only road he understood - fear. Even when he knew change couldn't be stopped, his policy agenda deliberately postponed it knowing the harm it would cause. He was a fear addled beaver damming the nation's river of national development

He came into power at a time when Australia was moving in a direction to become more of what we *could* be as a nation. Howard deliberately changed that direction to make Australia become a country that only did things he wasn't scared of. He was a man scared of many, many things.

every time there's political violence discourse i think about how jo cox was assassinated in broad daylight by a fascist who shouted "britain first" as he shot her, and now nine years later her party is dedicating every moment in power to placating the ideology of her murderer

Here are some things that Charlie Kirk said in his life.

The man is dead, and so it only seems fair to share his legacy by cataloguing the values he spread while alive.